Following Cleveland’s second-round sweep of the Raptors, former Cavaliers GM David Griffin joined Bill Simmons on The Bill Simmons Podcast to discuss the genius of LeBron James and the relationship between him and ex-teammate Kyrie Irving.

At the 46:35-mark of the episode, Simmons asked Griffin about James’ new penchant for circus shots in the NBA Playoffs, citing multiple unorthodox buzzer beaters. That addition to James’ arsenal may have been pulled from Irving’s playbook, Griffin believes.

Listen here:

Simmons: He’s playing against himself and not the other people, and saying ‘Oh, I wonder if I can make this shot. I’ll try this one.’ I never remember him doing this before, do you?

Griffin: It’s funny, bringing this somewhat full circle, this is something I give Kyrie a lot of credit for. Because Kyrie was natively like that. He loved to make left-handed finishes that seemed circus-like that he had no reason to use but he would anyway. He would do it in practices, he and Shump would play one-on-one endlessly after practice, doing things like that. And LeBron sort of got in the routine of doing these weird, one-legged, left-handed sort of things, finish with spin for no reason.

I think Kyrie, in a weird sort of way, really made LeBron start to think about ‘You know, there’s more that I’m capable of doing. I don’t have a left-handed runner; I can’t spin the ball off the glass.’ I think Kyrie’s talents and knack for doing things like that challenged LeBron. Bron thought and went ‘I want that,’ and he’s so damn good he can incorporate it into his own game.

To me, maybe that’s the best LeBron story. There’s literally nothing you can show him that he can’t do.

James gave the Cavs a series lead in the first round with a game-winning buzzer-beater against Indiana in Game 5, and vanquished Toronto’s hopes and dreams in the second round with another game-winning shot in Game 3—a running floater from the left side, off the glass.

This is, perhaps, yet another level for James, who was criticized earlier in his career for not taking the final shot when games were on the line. He does anything now. He does everything now. By drawing from his experience with Irving, he has become a more complete player in a seemingly effortless way.

It’s a shame that Irving is injured, or we’d get to see the two former teammates battle it out and show each other what they’ve learned from one another.

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